Trump orders new census and excludes undocumented immigrants

Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

U.S. President Donald Trump announced Thursday that he has instructed the Department of Commerce to immediately launch a new, "highly accurate" census that would exclude people living in the country without documentation from the population count. The decision was announced in a post on Truth Social, where Trump stated that the census would be based on "current facts and figures" and the results of the 2024 presidential election. He also emphasized, "People who are in our country without documentation will not be counted in the census."

What does the new proposal represent?

This proposal represents a radical change from traditional census practices, which count all residents regardless of their immigration status.

During his first term, Trump already tried to include a citizenship question on the 2020 census., which was blocked by the Supreme Court on insufficient grounds. He later signed a memorandum to exclude undocumented immigrants from the count used to distribute seats, but the initiative was declared illegal by the courts.

The current announcement revives legal measures and practices that were repealed by President Biden in 2021.

Possible consequences

Excluding undocumented immigrants could reduce political representation and federal funding for states with high immigrant populations, such as California, Texas, and Florida, while benefiting others with a smaller presence of this group.

Legally, the proposal faces significant obstacles, as the Constitution and judicial precedents stipulate that only Congress has the authority to determine how the census is conducted.

Designing a new census is a monumental task that takes years of planning, and preparation for the 2030 census is already underway.

The initiative is also part of a broader government strategy to shift the electoral map in favor of Republicans, coinciding with redistricting battles like the one in Texas, where additional seats are being contested.

For more stories like this, follow More Latin.

Sources:

• CNN